Published on 12, July, 2020
Hello.
I am a 44 year old who is attemting to go through rehab from adddiction to benzodiazapines (the latest in a lifetime of drug problems) that I feel have been my attempt at dealing with undiagnosed Autism/Asperger's. While my GP is a very understanding about the benzos and is tapering me off them I have also been shunted off to CBT (cognitive behavioural therapy) for the second time. The first time I just agreed with everything they said so I could get out as quickly as possible.
This time around they know about the addiction but basically CBT does not even remotely deal with whay I feel and have felt my whole life. I've been sent there probably because they think it will help me deal with panic attacks and social anxiety. But it goes way beyond that. I have almost no friends and i have no desire to make any, they just want or expect me to do things I will hate. I can't even manage visiting my own family, I know I should want to but i don't. I just want to be left alone. I am supposed to go to my Dad's tomorrow for christmas dinner, but I won't.
I get incredibly anxious and irritated if I have to spend any time away from home, If I have to spend a night away at family I am annoyed by it and consider it a waste of my time that I should be doing something else with. Recently the demands put on me in that regard have been too much to handle as my stepmother was in hospital for 3 months and I felt I had to make weekly visits. I was worried about her as I don't want anything to change but I resented having to visit all the time and my use of benzodiazapines increased dramatically as a result, leading me to where I now find my self.
I tried to go on holiday with my brother and mum and ended up buying a flight home after 3 days as I couldn't cope with being away from home. They try to understand but I don't think ,they do. I just want to stay at home and be left to my own devices. I hate any break in that routine whatsoever. I barely manage to hold down a part time job at a casino and have just enough money to survive, but that is fine. I have to no children, no wife or girlfriend and no desire for one... in fact the idea seems utterly abhorent.
I want to approach this with the GP or maybe even the CBT therapist to stop her wasting her time because the goals she sees me achieving are something I just don't want. I don't want to meet new people, they'll just expect things from me that I can't give them. I just don't know what is the best way to go about this because at the moment I need to get free of my adiction, but long term I know that I need to get a diagnosis so that people will stop trying to turn me into someone I am not and do not want to be.
Sorry for the rant but it's all getting a to much right now.
Bilsner
Hi. thanks for your thoughts. I've taken the test you mentioned and scored 48, although I guess there's more to it than that. I think my problem is that I have so much baggage from dealing with being "on the outside" (as I saw it) that I'm stuck dealing with the fallout from that, ie a benzo addiction. Obviously this has be a priority and I don't want to do anything to jeopardize this. So I'm not going to bother the GP with it. But as far as CBT goes, it seems rather pointless carrying on with our supposed "goals"... I guess I just have to come clean with the therapist (for a second time as I never told the first one about the addiction).
I have no idea how that will go but I feel I need to start the journey to diagnosis as I just can't take anymore people trying to change me into a normal person. I don't want it, I don't need it and the continual assertions that I'm just like everyone else and just need help to get better are not helping. Of course the addiction doesn't help my position as it is very easy for people just to point to it as the reason I am the way I am, but it's not.
Also I feel it would help my family understand why I come across as cold. I love them all very much but I find it difficult to show it, which hurts them and makes me feel guilty.
Anyway, I have to work now, so thanks.